A Voice From The Past

Appeared in the Friday 10th November 2006 edition of the New Age


"The state of non-happening is once again strung together by the beads of rhetoric. But it no longer sparkles as in the olden days to cover the dark patches of national failures.

Nothing possibly could be worse than what it is today. Only doom can beat it all. Hence optimism fights back in a pitch dark tunnel of an unrewarding politics that holds little light at the end of it. Or it may as well be a blind tunnel with no way to go. We are just in the middle of it singly, collectively, and as a nation.

If the flower of democracy has wilted before it could blossom, we have no tears to shed for it. Because it hardly existed even in its distorted frame."

(Enayetullah Khan; Holiday, March 1975)


Mintu Bhai is not physically with us today. But this most courageous of persons I have ever known is with us in spirit. I can hear his voice as distinctly as I heard it 40 years ago. His voice urged us to go forward when, as students, we were fighting the Ayub dictatorship. His writings gave us hope during the dark days of the liberation war. His lead articles in Holiday through the early 1970s showed us that the conviction and conscience of even one person could shape the thought process of thousands. Mintu Bhai was more than a journalist. He was often the solitary voice of defiance. A voice that spoke of morality and ethics, a voice that could differentiate right from wrong. Had he been with us today, surely we would have heard the thunder of his pen.

But is he really gone? Can you not hear his voice as I do? The last few years of his life he had been warning the BNP of the effects of its misrule and unbridled corruption. How would he have described them now and what would he have said of their attempts to stay in power at all costs? Would he have again said what he did more than three decades ago, ‘The class-selfishness of this new elite of expropriators of properties and privileges – expropriations range from the sublime to the ridiculous, viz, houses, buildings, business establishments, cars, printing presses, cigarette-agencies, kerosene distributorship, gas stations, import licences, export trade and finally offices of profit – is in direct proportion to the sense of deprivation that each one of these expropriators suffered over the past twenty-four years. It has become what someone described as “of cannibalistic dimensions”. This is what in political history is known as the foetus of fascism – an oppositionless society propped up with the instruments of terror…

How would he have viewed President Iajuddin’s takeover of the office of the chief adviser? He would have said it was legally and morally wrong. Legally wrong as the president didn’t follow the constitution. As an eyewitness to the event, he would have reminded him that the framers of the amendment incorporating the non-party caretaker government had visualised a ‘pool of retired Chief Justices’ from whom a chief adviser would be appointed. That the president overlooked this is a violation of the constitution. A further violation was the fact that at no time did the president try to find and ‘appoint the Chief Advisor from among citizens of Bangladesh who are qualified to be appointed as Advisors under this article’. Instead he appointed himself to this demanding position. ‘A travesty of justice,’ Enayetullah Khan would have said. It was morally wrong because he would have pointed out that Professor Iajuddin is a party man which he cannot deny. He would have also reminded the president of his ill health which does not permit him more than a few working hours a day. He would have said, ‘Mr President, the nation is at the most critical juncture of its future. You are well enough to do justice to two positions. Please appoint another acceptable person as chief adviser and save this country from the impending chaos.’

What would he have thought of the Election Commission? With every one using the constitution as an excuse for not taking any action, Mintu Bhai would have reminded the nation that the constitution is made by the people and it exists to serve the people. He would have told the chief election commissioner, ‘Please do the moral thing. Please go.’ At the same time he would have reminded the president that in July 2001, he had said, ‘No controversial person should be in the Election Commission. The opposition’s demand and advice for making the administration neutral must be accepted.’ He would have urged Professor Iajuddin to heed his own advice. He would have advised the president not to be swayed or influenced by bureaucrats who have, as per Peter’s Principle, risen to their own levels of incompetence.

Again, the talk of the town is the possibility of the president calling out the armed forces in aid of civil authority. Enayetullah Khan had seen many forms of military intervention. He would have told the military to do their job to the best of their ability, but would remind them that they belong to the whole nation and not to any particular section. He would have pointed out that people’s will can never be suppressed and any attempt to go against popular demand will only lead to conflict.

Enayetullah Khan always had a sense of history. He knew when to rise to the occasion and never shied away from speaking bluntly when bluntness was necessary. But he also had an uncanny sense of foretelling dangers to come. It is that I miss the most, for I fear we are headed for a sea of uncertainty. As I ponder on our future, I wonder what we have actually achieved politically in the past three and half decades. Noting much I fear. I leave you with Mintu Bhai’s words from January 1972:

Armed revolutionary struggle encourages specific conditions on each continent, in each country; but these are neither natural nor obvious. And we had only the beginning of an armed struggle, the foetus of a revolution. In this historical task of liberation, the people of Bangladesh here have only achieved geographical independence, not national liberation. The struggle that was just about to begin is yet to unfold itself in its full vigour for the attainment of people’s democracy.